Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I do not know whether the Taoiseach, the Tánaiste or the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment, Deputy Bruton, is best placed to answer this question. It relates to the proposal to use the Mourne Mountains as a storage area for nuclear waste by the nuclear authorities in the UK. My understanding is that the Scottish Assembly ruled out such deep geological storage of nuclear waste in Scotland but the Northern Ireland Assembly agreed. It is uncertain as to what the parties in government in Northern Ireland have agreed or why they did so. That is one of the details the Government should seek to find out. The State has an interest in the matter under the Espoo Convention and a range of other conventions on transboundary effects. The Mountains of Mourne sweep down to the sea but they also sweep down to our waters and land. What contacts has the Government had with the UK authorities? What legislative or other measures does it intend to take to protect the people of Louth and the wider area? The material will be there for millennia. What, if anything, is the Government doing about this?

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